Kent Sorenson, who switched support from Michelle Bachmann to Ron Paul during the 2012 Republican presidential campaign, testified yesterday for the prosecution against Ron Paul Inc. operatives Jesse Benton and Dimitri Kesari.
Sorenson during his testimony came off as a weak-type out of a 1940s/1950s film noir, with Benton and Kesari as the in the shadows tough guys, attempting to keep the weak Sorenson in line.
At one point Kesari took Sorenson's cellphone away from him, fearing he would not be able to deal with questions from the press about his defection, Sorenson said in testimony.
"I was a wreck," he said.
At another point, testimony revealed that Benton upon learning from Kesari that Sorenson was having second thoughts about defecting fired off an email:
Fuck him, This is absurd.And then followed it up with another email:
Either he honors his commitment or we have to expose him as the money-grubbing shakedown artist that he is.Sorenson also testified as to the assurances he looked to from Benton as he arrived to announce his defection to the Ron Paul campaign:
"I remember specifically asking Jesse if they would take care of me," Sorenson testified, when asked whether he arrived at the Paul event with the expectation of being paid to change his endorsement. The response from Benton, according to Sorenson, was, "You're bleeding for us—we'll take care of you."Russ Choma has a blow-by-blow here.
-RW
This plot just amazes me. If Ron Paul is in private the principled man he is in public, WTF!!! were these guys thinking? Did Benton etc think Ron would approve this? That Ron would have wanted this? Given the risk it created for his campaign and doing something he didn't need done... Ron had the support he needed without this BS.
ReplyDeleteJust how much cache did this Sorenson guy deliver? What rank-and-file voter has EVER cared about a state politicreep's endorsement? I don't even know who my state reps are. I have continued to believe Benton etc were moles to ensure Ron's campaign would never get traction or even remotely threaten the establishment. That Benton was working for the dark side the entire time taking advantage of Ron's trusting nature. That's my take.